RE: Do pet scans show up Kidney Cancer turmors

my husband had a CT scan 2 years ago which showed a small mass in his left lung. We then had a PET Scan of the lung which came back as a non-malignent mass. He, however, insisted that it be removed... and it was a metastasis of RCC and he ended up having his lung resected. Until then, we had thought that the PET Scan was the cat's meow...no longer...

On 4/11/2007 Sharon13 wrote:

Does anyone know if Pet Scans work for Kidney cancer? I was told by two doctors that it doesn't show up? Thanks Sharon

RE: Do pet scans show up Kidney Cancer turmors

It is the cats meow! Just because it is not effective in ONE cancer does not detract from the fact that it is one of the best diagnostic tests to emerge for cancer patients since Roetgen discovered Xrays. One thing I see on this board is people making "all encompassing" judgements based on their or someone elses single experience. You have to look at the overall picture before you cast judgement. This is the anecdotal phenomenon someone takes one case and extrapolates it to ALL cases. This is how some nefarious and evil spirited people hawk their snake oil on this site, to the detriment of some people. And the ones whose advice they took shoulder no responsibility or guilt for giving it.

RE: Do pet scans show up Kidney Cancer turmors

Kidney cancer is one of those rare cancers that PET scans do not always detect. My scan did show the mass in my kidney, but does not always show if it is metastatic disease. My prayers are with you and your family. My name is Becky and I also have renal cell carcinoma T-3.

RE: Do pet scans show up Kidney Cancer turmors

With that said, and understood, Kidney cancer, as I have been told by my husband's oncologist, is one of the cancers that is not best followed with a PET scan. I understand it is a great tool for monitoring caner in general, I only was requesting to try to understand what makes kidney cancer so hard for the PET scan to diagnose or follow properly? I hoped you might have that information, for educational purposes only.

RE: Do pet scans show up Kidney Cancer turmors

Witchdoctor- I couldn't agree more with your reply. I work in Health Care with a number of surgeons (I am not a nurse) however I have learned so much from them and have come to understand that there are so many types of cancer we have to be greatful to the people working towards cures. I agree with you when you say we should read this board and take from it information that we can ask our oncologist and doctors and compare notes. My husband has MRCC and when they first put him on Intron A everyone told us that it wouldn't work and that it was not an effective drug. Hubby was told to get his ducks in a row and we were looking at 6 to 9 months. Well the Intron A did work for my husband we it worked for 3 1/2 years and my husband became a case study for oncology and urology. He went off the drug because of side effects and took nothing for 8 months. They saw a bit of movement in one of the tumors and decided to try him on nexavar. That was a disaster and was taken off it. He then has tried sutent and it comes with its own set of trials and tribulations. Here we are 5 years later. Sutent is projected on a lot of blogs on this site as the "wonderdrug" however it works differently for everyone and I beleive that we should not promote anyone medication. We should trust in our oncologists as they know our history and make the best decisions for the patients. What works for one doesn't necessarily work for another. So I think we should all look at our own situations, definately ask questions as wel learn a lot from each other then take that information to our oncologist and see what they say. RCC is not "A" typical but new things are happening every day. Thanks for your reply Mary aka Mazzy

RE: Do pet scans show up Kidney Cancer turmors

I will share our experience but leave it open for continued discussion. My doctor prefers to use a combination of CT and PET scans. All of my scans have been a CT/PET scan combo. He felt so strongly about this combination that he applied for a special approval from Pfizer to include this combination under their Sutent trial. A CT scan only was the approved protocol. Here is what we understand from our doctor---a CT scan shows the physical appearance of the mass very well and the PET scan shows the metabolic activity of the tumor (no metabolic activity means that the tumor is dead). This was important in our case because after my second treatment cycle on Sutent the PET scan showed no metabolic activity (meaning that the tumors were dead) even though they still appeared on the CT scan. It wasn't until my third or fourth treatment cycle that they disappeared from the CT scan as well. In the big picture this difference may sound minor but you all know how we jump at any good news along the RCC journey. For my wife and me, knowing that the tumors were dead made us feel very, very excited. Again, this may just be a doctor's preference but my oncologist has been in the kidney cancer area for 15+ years and we pay close attention to what he has to say. Good luck to all.